Andy Marte’s career path of Top-Flight Phenom to Respected Hopeful to now DFA’d Mystery has all the earmarks of a kid who had fudged about his age.

I like Ishikawa but I wouldn’t lose too much sleep if Marte were to take some of his at-bats. Rich Aurillia on the other hand…

Even if you pick him up on waivers and get a (basically) free look at him in ST, he’s still taking away exhibition game ABs from the young guys. So unless he hits the crap off the ball and makes the 25-man roster (unlikely at this point in his career), you’re right back where you started, except now Pablito and Ishikawa aren’t quite as ready for the regular season as they should be.

I’d rather see Jesus Guzman work his way into our line-up.

RANDY MEAT/RANDY AT ME
TARDY, MEAN
A MAD ENTRY
MANY TRADE
RAT MAY END
AND MY TEAR
NARY MATED
DARN MEATY
EAT DRY MAN

Do not believe there is enough ST innings for third basemen Sandoval, Uribe, Aurilia, Rohlinger and Guzman. Marte is out of options so it might be best if he passes through waivers first and then SF trades a bum to get him so they could put him in minor leagues.

Nope.

this is kind of an odd thing about me, in general I tend to be very much a pessimist (I say realist, others say pessimist) yet when it comes to failed prospects I’m almost always on the side of giving the guy another try.

The suck fairy comes with him and gets his spot on the 40-man.

This page is going to rank pretty high on “suck fairy darn meaty” searches.

Acquiring a corner outfielder at this point probably means fewer at-bats from Travis Ishikawa, who is a bit of a reclamation project in his own right.

Corner infielder?

I think the poll answers say it all: “Sure,” “Nah,” and “Yawn.” It’s pretty inconsequential. There isn’t much to be said either way except that if we don’t pick him up, we’ll never know. Who cares? Give the kid a friggin whirl. The more I look at it (the opportunity, not his PECOTA numbers, ugh), the more I see that there’s only upside to be had.

If it comes down to Juan Uribe possibly getting a roster spot, I’d rather take a chance on Andy Marte instead.

Normally I’m all for finding our own Carlos Pena or whatever, and giving some young guy a shot. But, not Andy Marte. Last year, I might have said maybe, the year before, definitely yes. But now he’s had several very reasonable chances to hold his own in the big leagues, and he sucked. Really, really sucked. Heck, the last two years he couldn’t even scrape together a OPS above .800 in AAA.

I mean, if you want a guy who has a chance of turning it around and busting out, at least give me a guy who got jerked around, or never got his chance, and was never quite healthy enough to put it together. Any one of those reasons, but really, anything to explain why he sucked before. But that’s not Marte. He’s had roughly a season’s worth of ABs at the big league level, and his career OPS is .602. At this point, it looks to me like his upside is 10-12 HRs over a full season, and struggling to get on base at anything better than a .270 clip.

Heck, it isn’t like the Indians are idiots, either. Frankly, them letting Marte go would tell me a lot more about his talent level the most teams taking a chance on him. If they had thought he would be remotely useful at the big league level, wouldn’t they have let him fill that third base hole? But no, they went out and traded for someone who could hit.

We have better options in house already. Vote NO on Proposition Andy Marte.

“I mean, c’mon. That’s the face of a man who was just informed that pie was available.”

Had the secretary sitting next to me looking at me like “wtf are u laffingz?”

Now I want pie too

I don’t like any of the options the Giants have around for backup corner/Sandoval and Ishikawa insurance. Aurilia, Phelps, Uribe…Why not add another guy who will probably suck into the mix?

Red, yellow, green, red, blue blue blue
Red, purple, green, yellow, orange, red red
Red, yellow, green, red, blue blue blue
Red, purple, green, yellow, orange, red red

Blend them up and what do you get?
Ceries, chartous, and aqua
Mauve, beige, and ultra marine, and every colour in between
Hazo ka li ka no cha lum bum

Colour has it’s harmony and just like I have said
Red, yellow, green, red, blue blue blue
Red, purple, green, yellow, orange, red red

Blend them all and what do you get?
Ceries, chartous, and aqua
Mauve, beige, and ultra marine, and every colour in between
Ing za ri ka fo zi brun brun

Colour has it’s harmony and just as I have said
Red, yellow, green, red, blue, pink, grey
And white, and plaid and blue, green, white, yellow and toodinz ‘n’ and and and
right and and strips with blue and a black and Plaid and a….a

oo and …vut vut, vait a second, vut vut’s going on wid all da colours?
Blue, red, green, green, white, white, black….
vut ever happened to just plain old lavender blue dilly dilly dilly dilly…….dilly
….silly

signing marte would be silly, is what all of this means

I don’t mind throwing Marte into the mix, especially now that it looks like Crede is going to Minnesota. I’d love to see Pablo get the hang of third, and Guzman would be my second choice, but I sure as hell prefer seeing the 25 year old Marte out there than Aurilia, Uribe, or McClain. At least with him you could hope that he gets better.

Cubs traded him to Baltimore and the Orioles look like they want to keep him.

Sabes sad…

God I love that Joe Pesci quote. There’s a song on the 88 Fingers Louie album Back On The Streets that opens with that and then jumps into some of the best damn melodic hardcore this side of the Potemkin city limits.

is exactly what we don’t need.

As I am currently stuck in Cleveland (please save your condolences), I’ve had the opportunity to see him in action, not to mention witness the surrounding hype. He’s a good kid, nice guy, but he doesn’t fit into the Giants’ infield carousel. A free swinger, this kid racks up a lot of Ks, and looks overmatched by a lot of major league pitching. He’s like an unpolished Happy Pete (assuming the term “polish” is applicable). What he needs is a team who can give him some MLB ABs and have a hell of a lot of patience with him… maybe even a mentor who’s on his way out (I don’t think Blake really could help him much).

In other words, he will not have a break out year because he is (over)due… and really, the Giants have enough wildcards around the horn. It just wouldn’t be a good match. But I hope he lands somewhere where he can get a shot, because when he hits it, its on the screws.

Maybe he’s really 27 years old and just hit the wall finally, and the Peter Principle finally took hold.

Also, people like to throw out Pena as an example, but that’s apples and oranges. Pena at least showed some ability in the majors before really breaking out with Tampa in 2007, Marte has shown nothing thus far. Even Phelps at least has some major league success,

Not interested. Unless they throw him some where in the minors after ST, then maybe.

If Cleveland finds no takers and releases Marte, the Giants could conceivably sign him to a minor league deal in order to be able to take a closer look in camp, and then continue to work with him in the minors if they think there is potential there (though there is still the Guzman issue). But picking him up on waivers means adding him to the 40-man roster, which – barring an immediate contract-clearing deal (say, Roberts) – is currently full, so someone has to go. And there isn’t anyone there I’d risk losing on waivers for Marte.

This is going to be an issue this year, and maybe next year too, because so many youngsters were added to the 40-man last year, way before there was any need for Rule 5 protection for them. Its one thing adding someone like Cain in mid-season 2005 or Lincecum in 2007 because you expect them to stick. Or adding a non-prospect as a stop-gap to fill a need, knowing (and not minding) that you might later lose them on waivers when you take them off the roster. But adding prospects years before they are Rule 5 eligible, when you have no expectation that they are ready for the majors is something else entirely. They take up roster space that you then can’t use to fill more immediate needs, and if you do later have to clear space for someone else – teams can claim them on waivers. Bocock, Burriss and Rohlinger were all taken in the 2006 draft, so they could not be lost in the Rule 5 until NEXT offseason. Bocock was added as a stopgap because the team had not prepared options in case of an injury to Omar; Burriss was added because Bocock turned out to be so painfully not ready; and Rohlinger was added late in the season for no apparent reason whatsoever. And then Gillaspie, who did not have to be added to the 40-man for Rule 5 purposes until December 2011 (!), was added reportedly as a way to give him a bit more money without going over slot on his bonus. Burriss at least surprised everyone and has a chance to make the team this year (though another year in the minors wouldn’t hurt), but the others have no chance at all (and most likely won’t make the team next year either) and yet take up three spots on the roster. Sabean & co. don’t seem to “get” the unnecessary risks and opportunity costs involved in adding very young prospects to the 40-man. They seem to have improved in many other important ways, but their 40-man management remains an issue.

One qualification: I haven’t managed to figure out the rules on outrighting players to the minors. Sometimes you can outright a player only after he goes through waivers first, but sometimes it seems like young minor leaguers can be outrighted once without risk. Anybody know anything about this? If indeed it is possible to outright Bocock, Rohlinger and Gillaspie in order to clear roster space with zero risk of losing them – all of the above may be irrelevent…

new, weird layout of the tags. Interesting.

This thread is the #1 Google result for “the suck fairy” – congratulations, Grant!

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